Octopus Tracker

Telegraph_Sam

I am happy to watch from the sidelines as participants in this forum argue points of detail which I would not get into myself. A kind of free ride. My position is similar to Masonic's post on 27 April. I monitor the savings I would make from being on Agile - from Octopus Compare. There does seem to be an advantage from being on Agile fairly consistently over recent time periods. BUT not enough to induce me to switch when there is the uncertainty over how the two tariffs would compare if prices were to rise significantly. I keep the position under review to use Government terminology when they can't make up their minds.
What I am finding is that Oct Compare regularly reports that it hasn't been able to obtain consumption data for a day in the recent past, and refers me back to the dashboard - which doesn't help. The position seems to rectify itself if I wait several hours before repeating the attempt. >>> Are other contributors experiencing the same problem??

masonic

Telegraph_Sam said:

What I am finding is that Oct Compare regularly reports that it hasn't been able to obtain consumption data for a day in the recent past, and refers me back to the dashboard - which doesn't help. The position seems to rectify itself if I wait several hours before repeating the attempt. >>> Are other contributors experiencing the same problem??

Missing days are not unusual, although I've not had one in the recent past. Octopus seems to have got a lot better at retrying, so as you say, gaps get filled in within a few days in most cases. The time "yesterday's" data becomes available can vary a lot from day to day. Sometimes I've had mine as early as 8am, other times I have to wait until the evening. Since I have a Home Mini, the Octopus app is always current to the minute.

niktheguru

Telegraph_Sam said:

I am happy to watch from the sidelines as participants in this forum argue points of detail which I would not get into myself. A kind of free ride. My position is similar to Masonic's post on 27 April. I monitor the savings I would make from being on Agile - from Octopus Compare. There does seem to be an advantage from being on Agile fairly consistently over recent time periods. BUT not enough to induce me to switch when there is the uncertainty over how the two tariffs would compare if prices were to rise significantly. I keep the position under review to use Government terminology when they can't make up their minds.
What I am finding is that Oct Compare regularly reports that it hasn't been able to obtain consumption data for a day in the recent past, and refers me back to the dashboard - which doesn't help. The position seems to rectify itself if I wait several hours before repeating the attempt. >>> Are other contributors experiencing the same problem??

It’s not for all, and given you’re such a low user Sam the benefit for you will probably be minor. For me though I’m easily saving 40-50 pounds a month on agile vs tracker, and that without massively load shifting. The newer tracker price rises certainly make agile more enticing than it used to be.

glad to see you finally took the plunge after much coercion and used octopus compare!

Telegraph_Sam

There are now "cheapest fixed deals" being promoted by Uswitch, Which etc. I think the main objective now  is to see how these compare with the observations of participants in this forum in outline, and only then get involved in the fine detail of Tracker vs Agile.
Is there info somewhere on the Home Mini?

northernsparky

Telegraph_Sam said:

There are now "cheapest fixed deals" being promoted by Uswitch, Which etc. I think the main objective now  is to see how these compare with the observations of participants in this forum in outline, and only then get involved in the fine detail of Tracker vs Agile.
Is there info somewhere on the Home Mini?

Try this https://octopus.energy/blog/octopus-home-mini/

Telegraph_Sam

Thanks. On first examination it looks like the main benefit is that it provides the (same) data in real time rather than with a time lag?

masonic

Telegraph_Sam said:

Thanks. On first examination it looks like the main benefit is that it provides the (same) data in real time rather than with a time lag?

Essentially, yes. It is designed to be an upgrade to the IHD that allows you to see live usage via your mobile phone from anywhere.

Telegraph_Sam

More use / relevant for Agile people than for Trackers??  For the latter all we are concerned with, if we take the time to check, is having a quick and easy check that the values invoiced on a given day are or were accurate without this necessarily being in real time.

freehugs_2

On the Agile V Tracker debate, we swapped to Agile in March, having compared the two for a while. Without any load shifting, we would have saved a pound or two a month on Agile, with fair bit of deliberate effort, looks like being about £10 PM cheaper (for low/med user, if you ignore the free windfall days which probably wont happen that often, but are  good fun). That deliberate effort means using delay start functions on various appliances i didnt know existed, so not really that hard. I do confess though, i get a weird amount of pleasure in doing these small optimisations, and that isnt probably everyone. But its one of the greenest things you can do - the cheapest times = when least fosil fuels are burnt, so less carbon is generated 'in our names'. 

Telegraph_Sam

May I throw into the debate the influence of solar panels. Even without expensive batteries, solars encourage me to act counter to the (Agile)  avoid peak times mantra. How to quantify / balance one against the other is above my pay grade.